Leo II

ON SAINT LEO II,

ROMAN PONTIFF.

A.D. 684.

A PRELIMINARY CHRONOLOGICAL SYNOPSIS.

Leo II, Roman Pontiff (S.)

D. P.

On the 28th day of June, the old Church of Rome

celebrated the feast of S. Leo the Pope

I, on account of a certain translation of his:

which afterward it seemed ought rather to be celebrated yearly on that very day,

on which his Body was first

delivered to burial in the basilica of S. Peter, On which day Leo I was translated, on the 11th day of April; on which also now

he is venerated; although otherwise he died on the 30th day of the preceding

October, in the year 461. On the same 28th day of June, in the years

thence 223, in the year of Christ 684, in the same place

was solemnly entombed S. Leo II; having died (as to us at least

it seems) on the 23rd of May preceding, and for a time

deposited in the Lateran Basilica, Leo II was deposited in the Vatican, like others everywhere;

often several months elapsing between the first and second deposition;

and the second only was inscribed in the Vatican Fasti,

as elsewhere has been shown.

[2] Labbe confesses, renowned for several books published into the light,

and of the history of the Pontiffs and Councils, if any other,

knowing; that in the whole series of the Roman Pontiffs, whose most intricate Pontificate

scarcely anything occurs more intricate than the beginning,

deeds, and death of Leo the Pope the second. I, adding

by interchanging between themselves the spaces, both of the See vacant before,

which was defined as one year, 7 months, 5 days;

and of the same obtained, which was said to have been 10 months, 18 days.

So after the death of his predecessor Agatho,

who died on the 1st of November of the year 681, I seem to have extricated [it, by interchanging the time ascribed to the vacant See, with that in which he held it.] through the said

10 months, 17 days, reaching even to the 19th of October

of the following year, in which Leo had been ordained on a Lord's Day;

through 1 year, 7 months, 5 days, I led him to

the 23rd of May of the year 684: after which day, and another vacancy

of 11 months and 20 days, there succeeded

in the Apostolic See, ordained, Benedict II, on the 14th

of May, likewise on a Lord's Day. Thus far in this

Chronology I persist: because I have not yet seen anything effective to the contrary:

but by it I seem to have escaped all

the difficulties, which to Labbe seemed inexplicable.

[3] It pleases not to reweave those things here at greater length, nor to reproduce

the Sermon, which Leo gave on the day of his Ordination, or

its Octave, as Lucas Holstenius thinks; under this beginning:

The pleasantness of today's feast invites us, The decree of election sent to Constantinople, Most beloved,

your fraternal concord in Christ with humble voice

to exhort, etc. Nor does it please more to reproduce

the Formula of the Decree, concerning the election of the same Leo

sent to the Princes; to which while a response is awaited at Constantinople,

it happened often in that age that the Interpontifices were

longer; since indeed not from the day of Election,

but of Consecration were reckoned the beginnings of Pontificates. The Decree begins:

Since not without the nod of the divine mercy is it, that

thus after the death of the supreme Pontiff, into

the election of one all the votes concur, etc. the sermon on the day of Ordination

I pass rather to the Life, as in Anastasius the Librarian

it is described, to be illustrated with Notes: if

one word I shall have premised about his cult. He had it on this day,

as I said, Leo the first, translated, already before the middle of the 8th century,

in which was written the old Roman Calendar,

by John Fronto published at Paris. Gregory

the Great, in his Sacramentary (if here there is nothing from the hand of an interpolator)

for the word Translatio, for Leo the First once inscribed on this day in the Fasti wrote Birthday

of S. Leo the Pope, certainly the First, since indeed the Second

sat nearly eighty years after Gregory. The same,

and not another, understood Wandelbertus of Prüm, in his

metric Martyrology, where he says:

By a Prelate the fourth (before the Kalends of July) rejoices,

and by a Doctor of the word, Leo.

In no other sense also speaks, augmented among the Monks of S. Genoveva,

Usuardus, on the same day, The Birthday of blessed

Leo the Pontiff and Doctor.

[4] But truly, after the Second of this name, raised from

his burial, together with the Third and Fourth, in

the oratory of Leo IV the Pope, the Second succeeded among the more recent, translated by Paschal III. of holy recollection the Lord

Paschal the Pope II reposited; as in the description

of the Roman Basilica, from the relation of eyewitnesses wrote

the Roman Presbyter, in the time of Eugenius Pope III (but

that Paschal sat from the year 1099 to 1118) there began

in several Ms. copies of Usuardus, and among very many

more recent, instead of the First, referred to April, to be celebrated

the Second, according to Anastasius on this day deposited:

which finally from Bellinus and others has been retained in the present-day

Roman Martyrology, where is read: His tomb in the Vatican crypts. At Rome, of S. Leo the Pope

the second: of whom also, perhaps from the time of the aforesaid Paschal,

an Office is prescribed with a proper Lesson from

Anastasius, as we find in the printed edition of the year 1479

and others thereafter. His tomb, like also of the other

two, the aforesaid Oratory being destroyed, lest it should hinder

the building of the new basilica, now is shown in the Vatican

crypts, without any singular honor. But whether

elsewhere Relics received thence are had, is hidden from me; while

nearly all wish them to be of the First, if any they have.

[3] That this Pontiff was by country a Sicilian, since

the Author of the Life asserts, no one doubts: but Messina, By country a Sicilian,

as wrote D. Antoninus Languidara, most studious of our work

there, by a certain proper right believes him to be its own. For,

anciently to this city on the northern part

there grew a suburb, which up to

this day the common people call S. Leo's: in which also

in the old Messina and Gallican Breviary, which

we have read preserved up to the time of Pius V, he is believed to have been of Messina, was prescribed

and the Papaleone family is thought thence to have taken its surname,

by Cajetan, in memory of common origin with him. Wherefore

on the gate which leads to the aforesaid suburb, this inscription carved is read;

To God the Best and Greatest, to the Lord Leo II Supreme Pontiff,

their fellow-citizen, where a suburb and church called after him and the Papaleone family. the Senate and People of Messina, the Leonine Gate

placed, dedicated, and gave, in the month of December in the year of Christ. To the same opinion

conspire Silvester Maurolycus, in the Ocean

of Religions, page 92; Stephanus Maurus, in his

Messina the Proto-Metropolis, page 239; Placidus Samperus

of the Society of Jesus, in the Marian Iconology, page 92, Sicilians

all; and Carolus Jongolinus, an Italian of Fano,

in his Hendegraphia, discourse 3, chapter 104, to me by Languidara

indicated: who then adds, that of the same holy

Pontiff the Relics are reverently preserved in the church

of the Fathers Clerks Minor, under the title of S. Agatha;

and that the fame to these very times brought down

flourishes, that his natal house existed

in that place, The people of Aidone also say he was born among them. where now rises the most celebrated convent

of Monte-Vergine, by blessed Eustochia

of Messina founded. These he wrote to me on the Ides

of May, in the year 1687. Yet I would not from Cajetan

dissemble that the inhabitants of the town of Aidone among the

Leontines, likewise as the people of Messina, of S. Leo born among them

glory, and on that title have a church dedicated to him,

with the inscription, To the Lord Leo Pope II,

Citizen and Patron, the Order and People of Aidone

erected this Basilica. Not that their town

is so ancient (inasmuch as founded by the Lombards, who followed Roger

the Count into Sicily, about the year 1090)

but that from the ruins of old Herlita, a once splendid

city, as the remaining ruins still show, it is believed to have arisen,

and that Leo was of Herlita: which

to the Sicilians furthermore to dispute I leave.

ACTA

From Anastasius the Librarian.

Leo II, Roman Pontiff (S.)

BY THE AUTHOR D. P.

[1] Leo, by nation a Sicilian, of his father Paul,

sat ten months, seventeen days;

Scriptures sufficiently instructed; in the Greek and Latin

tongue learned, in chant and psalmody

preeminent, and in their senses by most subtle exercise

polished; in tongue also a Scholar,

eloquent, and by greater reading refined: an exhorter

of all good works, instilling into very many a most flourishing

knowledge: a lover of poverty;

and toward the provision of the needy, not only

with the piety of his mind, but also with the labor of his zeal solicitous.

[2] He received the holy sixth Synod,

which by God's providence lately in the Royal city

was celebrated, written in the Greek tongue, the most pious great Prince

Constantine carrying out and presiding within his royal

Palace, which is called Trullus.

And at the same time with him the Legates of the Apostolic See,

and two Patriarchs, that is

of Constantinople and of Antioch, and a hundred

fifty Bishops; in which were condemned

Cyrus, Sergius, Honorius, Pyrrhus,

Paul and Peter; and also Macarius

with his disciple Stephen; but also Polychronius

the new Simon, who one will and

operation in the Lord Jesus Christ said

and preached, or whoever finally were to preach [it]

and have defended [it]: but it was decreed,

that also now two wills and operations

of the same dispenser Christ and Saviour our God

be said; as the same Synod, most studiously

into Latin translated, declares. Yet

of the aforewritten defenders the chief, namely

Macarius, Stephen, Polychronius and Anastasius,

since they would not recede from their purpose, at Rome

through various Monasteries were thrust away.

[4] Which aforesaid most holy man Leo, absolved

two men in receiving communion, who

from the Royal city with the aforesaid Macarius and the rest

into the Roman city were sent; who not yet

by the Synod had been anathematized, that is Anastasius

the Presbyter and Leontius the Deacon

of the Church of Constantinople, on the day of S. Theophany;

setting forth namely by their own writings

their faith, according to what the holy Synod also determined,

anathematizing namely all

the said heretics; but also the aforewritten men their accomplices,

whom the holy Synod or the Apostolic See

anathematized.

[5] In his times, by the running Imperial command

of the most clement Prince, was restored the church

of the Ravennese, under the ordination of the Apostolic See,

so that, the Archbishop being dead, he who was elected,

according to ancient custom, into the city

of Rome should come to be ordained. He made a constitution,

which is contained in the archive of the Church, that

he who shall be ordained Archbishop, by no custom,

for the use of the Pallium or the various Offices

of the Church, ought to pay; but also that for Maurus,

formerly the Bishop, the anniversary or the agenda

should [not] be celebrated. But also the type of Autocephaly,

which the Archbishops of Ravenna had drawn out for themselves,

for cutting off scandals, to the Apostolic See they restored.

[6] He made a church in the city of Rome beside S.

Bibiana, where also the bodies of the holy Simplicius,

Faustinus and Beatrix and of other Martyrs

he reposited; and dedicated it to the name of S. Paul the Apostle.

By the command of this gracious Pontiff a church beside the Golden Veil,

in honor of B. Sebastian

was built, and also in honor of the Martyr

George, on the 22nd day of February, where also gifts

he offered.

[7] In his times on the sixteenth day of the month

of April, in the eleventh Indiction, the moon

underwent an eclipse. After the Lord's Supper, almost the whole night

it labored in a bloody countenance, and not until after the cock's

crowing did it begin little by little to grow clear, and

to return to its own aspect.

[8] He made one ordination in the month

of June on the twenty-seventh day, Presbyters

nine, Deacons three, Bishops through various

places to the number of twenty-three. He also was buried

at B. Peter the Apostle on the fourth day of the Kalends

of July. And the Episcopate ceased for

11 months, 22 days.

[9] Which also the aforewritten most holy

man, was ordained by three Bishops, that is, Andrew

of Ostia, John of Porto, and the Placentine

of Velletri, for that the Albanensian Church

had by no means a Bishop.

NOTES. D. P.

f George and Macarius.

p These Saints are venerated on the 29th of July, having suffered under Diocletian: but no traces remain any longer of the church of S. Paul beside S. Bibiana: but of the bodies of the Saints what was done, I am eager to learn, for neither does Pancirolius mention them in the Hidden Treasures of the city of Rome.

q In the year 683 having the Dominical letter D, the 22nd of February fell on a Sunday, fit for such an action.

r To the same year 683 all these things uniquely square: it cannot therefore be, that in this year, on the 15th day of August, as Baronius thinks, Leo was first ordained.

s Another reading, of July; but I prefer June: because of this month the 27th day fell on a Saturday of the aforesaid year; of July on a Monday: but Ordinations were wont to be made on a Saturday or Sunday. This furthermore agreement of Sunday and Saturday, as it makes strongly for the year in which they so occur, so against the same, if first on the 15th of August Leo had been ordained. For nothing to the matter makes the election made before the 10th of January: because this at that time did not constitute an absolute Pontiff, until the Emperor's confirmation had been added.

t Otherwise on the Fifth of the Nones of July: but this in the year 684, having the Dominical letter B, was a Sunday, unfit for caring for funerals.

v Otherwise 10 months, 21 days: but the former reading is more apt, because by it Benedict II is had elected in the year 685 on a Sunday, namely the 14th of May; by the Dominical letter A.

x This little appendix seems to be of Anastasius himself, taken from elsewhere; and therefore here referred to the end out of order.

y Juvenal namely being dead, after his return from the aforesaid Council: but it seems that for a longer time, I know not from what cause, that See was vacant, or rather from the series of the Bishops of Albano one or another fell out, who sat before Andrew, known for the year 721.

APPENDIX D. P.

On the body of S. Leo the Pope at Ferrara.

Leo II, Roman Pontiff (S.)

BY THE AUTHOR D. P.

[1] His cult at Ferrara on this day In the year 1660 I and my Master P. Godefridus

Henschenius, setting out for Rome, through Ferrara

passed in the month of November; and among other

churches of that city, we visited on the 12th day of the month

the Parochial church of S. Stephen, and its ornament and brightness

praising, we venerated, set on each side of the choir,

two notable chests, of which the left was said

to contain the body of S. Romanus the Martyr, of

whom there will be place to treat on the 9th of August; but in the right

part the body of S. Leo the Pope II. But we were admonished by him

who was conducting us, P. Andreas Lazarus, an excellent old man,

and well deserving of this work several times, that an Apostolic

Nuncio had forbidden, that it should be venerated as such;

the Romans among themselves maintaining, that the four bodies

of the holy Leos [are] there. dismissed by the command of the Pontifical Nuncio; Discontinued therefore on this day

was the cult, nor was another day substituted; and no Saint

of this name then occurred to us, of whom that body could be

by any probable conjecture we could opine.

For although that it was carried away from Vico-habentia Voghenza

was established; and that there had been a certain Bishop S. Leus

or Leo, to be venerated on the 1st of August, we remembered;

yet we remembered concerning his body at Monte-Feretrano

(whither from destroyed Vico-habentia the Episcopal See

with the Relics of the Saints was translated) to have received documents so clear,

that his presence there did not seem

able to be called into doubt.

[2] Thus, doubtful, we asked to have described for us the one which

on the wall we read, on a marble tablet carved in gilded letters,

Greatest, in the year from the Virgin's Childbearing 1509, on the 3rd of the Kalends

of July, [a doubt being moved concerning the truth of the translation made in the year 1509] under Pope Julius II, Alfonso of Este Duke

III, and Hippolytus his brother, Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church

and Bishop of Ferrara; in this sepulchre, where the ashes of Faustina

once were reposited, the Venerable Jacobus Benzonus,

Bishop and Protomartyr of this church,

found a leaden chest spread with bones,

in which these things carved were read: Here rests

the body of S. Leo, after another of the year 1081 Pontiff and Priest of Christ,

translated hither from Vico-habentia, under Gratian

Bishop of Ferrara, A.D. 1000, on the 16th of the Kalends

of March, in the fourth Indiction. For which reason a supplication being appointed,

by the venerable College of Priests,

most religiously in the same place the same bones were reposited,

in the same year (namely 1509) on the Ides

of July, then falling on a Lord's day, under the course

of the Dominical letter G; as also

in the year 1081, the Dominical letter C running, it is to be observed,

the 14th day of February concurring with a Lord's day;

the number of the year squaring with the number

of the Roman Indiction. Marcus Antonius Guarini, in

the historical Compendium of Ferrarese affairs, page 129, with the chest of Faustina.

recites the aforesaid title, and says that that sepulchre was

inscribed with these letters, To the Departed Spirits. Annia Faustina living

placed [it] for herself. The first letters, indicating it to be a stone sacred to the Departed Spirits, argue Faustina to have been a Gentile: yet that her ashes collected

at some time there lay the inscription does not prove, but rather

the contrary; inasmuch as after Faustina's death it was left

imperfect; because elsewhere namely she was buried. But Guarini praises

the chest, as one of the more beautiful monuments,

which the Ferrarese dominion has.

[3] The same Guarini relates the history of the body brought to Ferrara

of which we treat, in this manner. Anselmus, kinsman

of Aistulf King of the Lombards, [Meanwhile the body is said to have been brought about 754 from Rome to Nonantola,] with the consent

of Huntrudis his wife, about to begin

monastery, under a Privilege of Zacharias

the Pope for it obtained, together with the bodies of the holy

Martyrs Synesius and Theopompus; to whom

then Stephen II, the successor of Zacharias, added

the bodies of the holy Pontiffs and Confessors, in 1006 [from Vico-habentia,]

Silvester and Leo II, about the year

754. Afterward in the year 1006 a pestilence prevailed

through Italy, for whose extinguishing the cause

the Monks of Nonantola first the bodies of the aforesaid holy Martyrs

brought forth, through the diocese

of Bologna processionally to be carried about:

which to their place being brought back, to be carried about

likewise they decreed the body of S. Leo through

the diocese of Ferrara. But its bearers,

when they had come to Vico-habentia, 10 miles

distant from Ferrara, and thence to Ferrara in 1081. there were all extinguished by the pestilence

in the month of April; and so that sacred deposit

remained there, until the year 1081,

when it to Ferrara brought Gratian, as

already has been said. Furthermore the successor of Gratian, Samuel,

in the year 83 of the same century, on the 17th day

of April, by the hand of Gregory the Priest, gave an Instrument,

by which half of the church of S.

Stephen he delivered to the Chapter of the Cathedral church;

but the other, together with the body of S. Leo,

added Guido of Arezzo, under an instrument of the year

92, on the 9th of January, by the hands of Jacobus once

[son] of Peter Antonius: and this donation thereafter

confirmed the Roman Pontiffs, in the year 1187

Gregory VII VIII, in 98 Innocent

III; in 1275 Alexander IV.

[4] The form and situation of the aforesaid chest These things thus asserted by Guarini, if, the instruments themselves being produced,

which are cited, they hold good; it could indeed

be prohibited, that to S. Leo the Pope II in the city

of Ferrara cult be given; but it will not be possible forthwith

to dislodge the citizens from their ingrained and from their ancestors received belief,

that his body, or a great part of it,

is among them; unless perhaps, the chest which at Rome is still shown

being opened, they shall have shown that there is still

held entire the number of sacred bones once reposited. I to prejudge

neither of the contending parties intend; but what I have found,

I simply report: and what our Father John

Paul Senerthus, being asked to send us an accurate description of that chest,

submitted as follows, received from a learned

and pious man.

[5] The body of S. Leo the Pope anciently rested

in a leaden chest, of length about five

palms, and of height one; but this

was enclosed in another chest likewise, but of marble

of the stone commonly called Travertine or Macigno,

inserted in the wall of the church of S. Stephen at the left

side outside the greater chapel; on two bases

so resting, that almost wholly it projected outside the wall

raised above the pavement ten palms.

The form of the chest was altogether flat, on whose front

face these words were read; The Body

of S. Leo the Pope. The cover wrought

with scaly work (such namely as is that of the urn, at the 6th

of June in the second Norbertine Corollary, number 38, represented)

projecting at the four corners as many

human heads of low relief. That chest

was long sixteen, high six palms. the specification of the bones reposited in it. But

now that cover and the bases, shapeless stones,

lie outside the church: but the chest has been made a repository

of another wooden one, sculpted and gilded,

in which the leaden one is enclosed, and at the same time placed

under the high altar, to which was translated the body

of that holy Pontiff, as appears from the title

placed at the right side of the same altar.

On occasion of the translation the leaden chest was opened,

and found therein were three oblong bones,

namely of the legs or hips, with the bone commonly

called Scio (Ischion), some little ribs and many ashes,

and nothing else. The body therefore is said to be a notable

part of the body, which to be present among the Ferrarese, they will not,

I believe, wish to deny, the Romans, unless the same which here

are named bones, the sepulchre likewise being opened, they are prepared

to show. Accordingly deservedly will the Ferrarese act, that their

ancient use be restored to them.